


Unsubtle Languages

by Sour_Idealist



Category: Critical Role: Wildemount Campaign (Web Series)
Genre: Gen, Genderfluid Character, Questioning character
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-23
Updated: 2018-02-23
Packaged: 2019-03-22 18:48:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 989
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13770300
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sour_Idealist/pseuds/Sour_Idealist
Summary: “Would you like these?” she asks. “They're a present. Um. If you want them.”“Why, thank you,” he says, taking the posy. It's mostly hedgerow weeds, a lot of goldenrod, but she's put them together well, and bound them up with strands of grass so they hold together. She's got an eye for beauty, their Nott, and she's good with her hands. “These are very nice –” And she's watching him with the same fixed, studious fascination she uses on a shelf of goods she's about to pocket. “And, you know, I feel like you're asking me a question with these.”





	Unsubtle Languages

**Author's Note:**

> Two hours before the next ep is a PERFECTLY reasonable time to post fic, what are you talking about.
> 
> Many thanks to my wonderful wife, who doesn't even watch this show, for reading this over for me! <3

“Mollymauk?” Nott's voice cuts through his reverie.

“Mmm?” It's a golden afternoon in the last glorious days of fall, with all the trees afire, and the sky that particular brilliant blue that only happened during harvest. The group's pulled over to the side of the road to give WC a break, poor beast, and everyone else has wandered off to get into their own trouble, leaving Molly to hang his feet off the back of the wagon and polish his scimitars. Except, apparently, for Nott, who's leaning on the tailgate with a bundle of flowers in her hand.

“Would you like these?” she asks, holding them up. “They're a present. Um. If you want them.”

“Why, thank you,” he says, taking the posy. It's mostly hedgerow weeds, a lot of goldenrod, but she's put them together well, and bound them up with strands of grass so they hold together. She's got an eye for beauty, their Nott, and she's good with her hands. “These are very nice –” And she's watching him with the same fixed, studious fascination she uses on a shelf of goods she's about to pocket. “And, you know, I feel like you're asking me a question with these.”

“A little, yeah,” she says, her ears twitching defensively. “I mean. You're wearing a skirt.”

Molly is. Molly's also been smiling offhandedly all day as it flutters around his knees. No one else has said anything about it, although he's caught them all sneaking glances – mostly Beau.

“I am,” Molly says. “A lot of people wear skirts. And a lot of people like flowers.” He shrugs.

“Well.” Nott scuffs at the dirt. “All right, then. Sorry to bother you.” She turns away, her ears wilting. Molly bites at his lip.

“Nott,” he says. “Really, thank you. They're very nice. And, uh...” He turns the little posy over in his hands. It really is a beautiful thing she's pulled out of the ditches. And, well – Nott is kind the way Molly himself is loud: carefully, intentionally, and like a counterweight to something. He clears his throat. “I know I haven't always been what you'd call the most forthcoming –”

“You really haven't,” Nott interjects.

“But honestly, that's actually the best answer I can give you right now,” Molly finishes. It takes a little effort to hold the flowers gently in his hands; his free fingers wrap around the edge of the cart, gripping tight. But when he looks up, Nott is only nodding.

“All right,” she says, and clambers up onto the tailgate behind him. The way she moves looks ungainly at first, but now he's getting used to her, there's a kind of grace to it. “You've been nice about, you know. Reminding people I'm a girl. It's sweet of you.”

“No trouble,” Molly says. He's gotten it wrong a few times too; he's sure of that. Nott's hard to quantify, hard to think of as anything but teeth and matted hair and the predatory goblin shape of her jaw. He's not proud of it, given what he is; enough people have looked at him and only thought _enemy_ too. (And then there's the... rest of it.) He'd like to do better. “Did you, well. Start waking up at some point and thinking you'd like to put flowers in your hair?”

“No – well, I mean, I did, but not the way I think you're asking,” she says. Her ears twitch. “No one ever... people only forgot I was a girl when I had clothes on?”

“Well, that's one way to make it clear,” Molly says, laughing. There's a story in the rest of it, a story in every part of this, but he's not going to be the one to ask her for it. Instead he fishes in his belt pouch for a piece of string and starts binding the flowers to one of his scabbards. When he glances up, Nott is watching his hands, smiling.

The thing is: Mollymauk Tealeaf is a patchwork of secondhand silk and hand-me-down cards and the tattoos that he got as if marking up his skin would ink over the decades of his life he can't remember. This – this _thing_ that's been steeping his mind since around when they met Watchmaster Bryce, bumping up against the way he's always moved like a much smaller person and the way “this man” has never really made him any happier than “this creature” in a stranger's mouth – this question he's been asking lately. It's not the first time he's chased a part of himself through the depths of his mind in order to get a good look at it. This one is just proving hard to pin down, and it's pervasive, and there's enough he doesn't know about himself already. Any new uncertainty would be a little frightening. But this, sitting here in a late-fall breeze with a gift of flowers in his lap and his feet crossed at the ankles and his skirt fluttering against his skin, with the sunlight warm on his face and Nott smiling at him – this is good.

“If anything changes,” he says, running his fingers along the edge of the goldenrod. “If there's anything I want you all to change, I'll let you know. Right now, I just like being hard to pin down.”

“All right,” Nott says, pursing her lips. “Oh, you know – I stole some apples when we passed that last farm. Do you want one?”

“I would,” Molly says. Nott doesn't offer food around very much, even if she'll share it if you ask. But Molly has a policy against turning food down; and Nott's making a lot of loaded offers today, but ones with – well, with strings, but ones he thinks he's willing to accept. And it's perfect weather for apples. “Thank you.”

The apples are tart and crunchy and perfect, and Nott and Molly lick their fingers clean with their feet swaying above the road.

 


End file.
